The 5 K’s spot win for Habs and …

Team captain Saku Koivu, Alex Kovalev, The Kostityn brothers and Tom Kostopolous shine for the Habs in game 1 in the Eastern Conference semi-finals.

The Canadiens got off to a pretty good start, but was luck was not on their side, a few goal post, and open net, but could not get one in. The Flyers where able to capitalise on the bad bounces from the Canadiens defensemen. First, Patrice Brisebois tried to intercept a pass and deflected it in back of Carey Price. A few minutes later, an another mistake caused the second Flyers goal. The Flyers went in to the dressing room with a 2-0 lead.

The Canadiens got their legs back and took advantage of the Flyers lack of speed on defense and Andrei Kostityn scored on a missed pass from brother Sergei. The Habs number 46 had missed on a penalty shot. On contraversial goal by Alex Kovalev while short-handed.

In the third, in the opening seconds, Carey Price mishandled a shot, and bounced of Joffrey Lupul skate and landed behind the Habs goaltender. With a minute and nine seconds to go in the game, Flyers take a penalty, Coach Carbonneau calls a time out and pulls Carey Price in favour of a sixth player on the powerplay. Alex Kovalev flips a wrist shot past Flyers goaltender, Martin Biron, to tie things up with 29 seconds left.

In the early stages of the overtime, with less than a minute played, journeyman, Tom Kostopolous ticks one in behind Biron and wins it for the Habs to the joy of the Full house fans in the Bell Centre.

Alex Kovalev and Tom Kostopolous got Stars one and three, and also honoured as NHL.com’s stars two and three.

Habs and Flyers return for game two tomorrow night at 7 pm at the Bell Centre on RDS or CBC’s Hockey night in Canada.

After shinning in the series against the Minnesota Wild, Jose Theodore had a nightmare evening last night in game 1 of the Detroit and Colorado semi-final. After seeing his team take a 1-0 lead, he was victim of four unanswered Detroit goals, before being pulled by Colorado coach Joel Quenneville for Peter Budaj, who gave up nothing. Colorado got a lift and stormed towards a comeback, but fell short a goal. Will Quenneville go back with Theodore or will he chance it with Budaj ? We shall find out tomorrow afternoon at 3pm in Detroit, catch the game on NBC or on TSN.

The other two conference semi-finals start tonight in Pittsburgh and in San Jose.

Stanley Cup up for grabs

Last year's Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks were eliminated last night by the Dallas Stars. The Ducks elimination should really come as no surprise, as the team struggled in the first half of the season. The Niedermayer and Selanne lack of decision on their possiblement retirements created a distraction, and the team never really blended together. The speculation and the rumour mill will run wild now, will Burke stay in Anaheim, or take on a new challenge ? Will it be Vancouver or will he go east to Toronto? The same can be said about Niedermayer and Selanne. Stay tuned folks.

Habs and Boston play the decisif game 7 tonight in Montreal. For the young Habs this is turning out to be one learning experience in playoff hockey. This is the second time in four years that theboth teams play a game 7. In 2004, The Habs had shutout the Bruins 2-0, Richard Zednick was the hero in that game. Guy Carbonneau will be looking at the guys with game 7 experience to calme the younger guys down. This could turn out to be Carey Price's biggest game in his young career. Price seems to shine in tight situations, he will be put to the test for sure.

Detroit, Colorado, Pittsburgh, New York and Dallas will be watching the outcomes in the remaining series to find out who their next opponents will be.

Should be interesting folks, stay tuned.

The Real season begins tonight

Well after close to 7 months of regular season play, the real season begins tonight, as the first games of the playoffs take place. In the East, the return series between the Ottawa Senators and the Pittsburgh Penguins.Last year, The Sens made the Penguins look like amateurs, but this year the roles could reversed. The Ottawa team struggled all thru the second half of the season, they changed coach, and now they are without three key players that helped in last spring’s cup run. We will find out if they can get their focus back. It will be interesting to see how they react. The Penguins on the other hand, played well while Crosby was out with an injury, and did not miss a beat. As it has been proven in the past, games 1,3 and 5 are the pivotal games in a series, the team that wins those games, win the series. For Ottawa to have any chance at winning this match up with Pittsburgh, they must split the first two, if not, they could be in big trouble in games 3 and 4 in Ottawa, as the hill maybe to steep to go up, and time is never on your side when your down in a series. This goes also for all series, and all teams, win game 1. It puts pressure on the other team to get back in the series and gives you momemtum.

Predictions for round one:

East

Montreal in 5

Piitsburgh in 6

Washington in 7

New York Rangers in 7

West

Detroit in 5

Calgary in 7

Minnesota in 6

Anaheim in 5

Last night on Hockey night in Canada’s preview show, Ron Maclean sat with legendary coach, Scotty Bowman and went thru all the series in the hour long show. Scotty has a great memory, he had no notes or anything, knew everything he needed to know about key players and situations that arise during the playoffs. You can see the replay on CBC website.

Habs, Red Wings, Penguins and Sharks have qualified

The NHL’s oldest and most storied franchise has qualified for the 2008 Stanley cup playoffs. They did got their pass on Monday when beating the Ottawa Senators. The Canadiens are five wins away from matching the number of wins they had when they won the Stanley Cup fifteen years ago. In that season, teams played 84 games, the actual format of 82 was adopted in the 1995-96 season. It will be interesting to see if the Canadiens will start the playoffs in first, second or fourth in the East. With a first place or second place finish, the Habs could possibly meet either Boston or Philadelphia, two that have been manhandled by Les Glorieux all season.

For the Red Wings, up until a month ago, the season had just been routine, an another day at the office. As I write this, the Wings first place parking spot is not as safe, as the San Jose Sharks, are only 8 points out of first, and have a game in hand. The Detroit team has not missed playoffs since the 1989-90 season. They won three Stanley Cups during Scotty Bowman’s nine years as bench boss.

The Pittsburgh Penguins have made the playoffs for a second consecutive season since the end of the lock-out. Before last season’s appearance, they had missed them four consecutive seasons, not including the cancelled season. They are in a deep three way race to finish first in the Eastern conference with the Montreal Canadiens and the New Jersey Devils.

The San Jose Sharks with a surprising 10 game winning streak, is within striking range of first place with the Detroit Red Wings. Under the coaching of Ron Wilson the Sharks have not missed the playoffs, they made a good run in 2003-04 against the Calgary Flames. They have lost in the second round in previous two appearances. Could this be the year of the Shark ?

The Ottawa Senators, New Jersey Devils and the New York Rangers could very well get invitations to the playoffs in the next week or less, but most likely, as it has been since the end of the lock out, will be a tight race until April 6^th, the final day of season. Invitations could as well go out to Anaheim, the cup champions, Dallas and Minnesota. Vancouver, Colorado, Nashville and Edmonton will most likely fight it out until the end for spots 5 thru 8 in the Western conference. It will most likely be the same in the East between the Rangers, Flyers, Bruins and the Capitals. These guys have less than two weeks to settle all, as the playoffs start April 9^th.

Tough choices for the Leafs this summer

After failing to get one the big names to waive their no-trade or movement clauses, the Leafs will have to think about plan B over the summer. Maple Leaf sports and entertainement will have major finacial decisions to make, concerning, Bryan McCabe, Darcy Tucker, and Pavel Kubina. In those cases, the last resort is a contract buyout. Even with the buyouts, the Leafs would still be on the hook cap wise, but for lesser money and absorbed over a longer period of time, which gives a bit of breathing room, as only the 2 thirds of the contract is counted against your cap hit.

Let’s take the McCabe situation as an example. He has three years remaining, valued at14,500,000. At 2 thirds, it comes up to 9,633,333.33, which would be spread out over six years. In the first two years, the cap hit would be 1,650,000, for a savings of 4,100,000 spread over two years. In the four next years and the remainder of the contract, the cap hit will be 1,491,666.66, which comes up to a savings of 4,258,333.34, spread out over two years, for an amount of 2,129,166.67 in year 3 and 4. Years following, it will be dead cap space, as the savings will have been absorbed in the first four years. In Tucker’s case, he has 9 million in salary coming to him, at 2 thirds, it’s 6 million over six years, at a cap hit of 1 million a year approx. The savings though would be absorbed in the first three years, the other 3, is dead space. Kubina and McCabe buyouts, in the long run, would free up the most cap space, especially if they want to resign Sundin, at 5 or 6 million next season.

Pre deadline projections

Here we are with a bit less than 24 hours before the NHL’s trade deadline, (3pm Tuesday). So time for a final standing projection for both the Eastern and Western conferences. It’s not written in stone. I will redo the exercise one last time around mid march.

Eastern Conference

*division leaders

Eliminated

Rank	Team	Pts
1	Ottawa*	103 (goal diff)
2	New Jersey*	103
3	Carolina*	87
4	Pittsburgh	100
5	Montreal	98
6	Boston	94
7	Rangers	92
8	Buffalo	90
9	Flyers	89
10	Islanders	87
11	Washington	83
12	Atlanta	81
13	Florida	79 (more wins)
14	Toronto	79
15	Tampa Bay	75

The Western Conference

Rank	Team	Pts
1	Detroit*	114
2	Dallas*	103
3	Minnesota*	97
4	Anaheim	98 (more wins)
5	San Jose	98
6	Calgary	96
7	Vancouver	95
8	Nashville	92
9	Phoenix	90
10	Colorado	89
11	St-Louis	87
12	Columbus	86
13	Chicago	85
14	Edmonton	79
15	Los Angeles	72

Take away the point and see where they would stand

Like a lot of you out there, I totally dislike the NHL’s point system and seeding process. So I eliminated the point the for the OT/SO loss, and seeded the teams according to points, and not divisions. In this demonstration, I used the league’s last tie breaking process, goals for and goal against difference.

So this what the Eastern conference would look like.

	GP	W	L	OTL	PTS	GF	GA	DIFF
Ottawa	61	35	20	6	70	206	180	26
New Jersey	61	35	21	5	70	164	145	19
Pittsburgh	61	35	21	5	70	182	165	17
Montreal	62	33	20	9	66	196	177	19
Boston	60	31	23	6	62	160	164	-4
Carolina	64	31	28	5	62	188	204	-16
Buffalo	61	30	23	8	60	182	170	12
Philadelphia	61	30	25	6	60	187	177	10
Rangers	62	30	24	8	60	157	155	2
Islanders	62	30	25	7	60	154	176	-22
Washington	61	28	26	7	56	173	188	-15
Atlanta	62	29	29	4	58	168	200	-32
Florida	63	27	29	7	54	173	183	-10
Tampa Bay	61	25	29	7	50	174	198	-24
Toronto	62	25	28	9	50	169	199	-30

And the Western Conference

	GP	W	L	OTL	PTS	GF	GA	DIFF
Detroit	62	42	15	5	84	199	136	63
Dallas	64	37	22	6	74	185	158	27
Minnesota	61	34	22	5	68	169	166	3
Anaheim	64	34	22	7	68	159	159	0
San Jose	61	32	21	8	64	159	150	9
Nashville	63	32	23	8	64	183	175	8
Vancouver	61	31	22	8	62	163	156	7
Phoenix	61	31	26	4	62	169	168	1
Calgary	61	31	22	8	62	177	177	0
Colorado	61	30	25	6	60	167	169	-2
St-Louis	60	28	23	9	56	158	159	-1
Colombus	63	28	26	9	56	153	166	-13
Chicago	60	28	26	6	56	169	169	0
Edmonton	61	27	29	5	54	164	183	-19
Los Angeles	63	26	34	3	52	181	206	-25

Let’s have a little more fun with this, let’s see what match-ups we would have in the first round, according to the tables above.

First round in the East :

Philadelphia-Ottawa

Buffalo-New Jersey

Carolina-Pittsburgh

Boston-Montreal

(what would spring be without a playoff series between those two.)

West:

Phoenix-Detroit

Vancouver-Dallas

Nashville-Minnesota

San Jose-Anaheim

Let’s take a look at what the match-ups we would see under the league’s actual system.

East:

Rangers-Senators

Buffalo-New Jersey

Boston-Carolina

Montreal-Pittsburgh

West :

Calgary-Detroit

Vancouver-Dallas

Nashville-Minnesota

San Jose-Anaheim